“If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’m nothing.” (1 Corinthians 13:3)

God’s love is sacrificing love. It is love which is revealed in the Cross of Christ. “God demonstrates his own love to us in this: While we were still sinners Christ died for us.” Charles Wesley wrote:

“Died he for me, who caused his pain?

For me, who him to death pursued?

Amazing love! how can it be

That Thou, my God shouldst die for me.”

Jesus taught us in the parable of the Good Samaritan that love for others meant showing mercy to those in need, by sacrificing our time and money to help them. In his response to the rich young ruler he told him to sell all that he had and give to the poor, and he would have treasure in heaven. He commended Zacchaeus for showing that he was changing his life by giving half of his ill-gotten gains to the poor. He saw a poor widow putting into the temple collection two very small copper coins and said that she had put in more than all the others. “All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.”

Yet here St. Paul is warning against sacrifice that is loveless. How can sacrifice, which is at the heart of the Gospel be thought loveless and worthless?

Sacrifice is worthless when it is motivated by the desire for selfish gain. Jesus told us that “when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”

We don’t give to win brownie points with God, to gain advantage in salvation, to offset our sins by bribing God, or polish our reputations in order to impress others. We give in response to need and in grateful response to God’s mercy to us. We give because we love others and wish to help them. We give because we love God and wish to be his partners in caring for the deserving poor. God “upholds the cause of the oppressed and gives food to the hungry” through his people. We give because the King, who is the Son of Man, is present in his people, and we will be judged by our response to him in his human suffering. “I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came and visited me.”

We give out of the love that God has poured into our hearts by his Spirit. We give in response to what God has given us, not because of what we can gain from it. Gratitude and our responsibility for others should be our motivation. We are stewards of all that God has given us. When we give out of gratitude, rather than gain, our gifts become a “fragrant offering, an acceptable sacrifice, pleasing to God.”

St. Paul also warns against giving one’s own life without love as gaining nothing. In so doing he condemns the glorification of martyrdom and the deliberate taking of one’s own life. Christians were not to court martyrdom. Muslim suicide bombers are fueled by the belief that martyrdom will gain a victory for God over unbelievers, and reward the martyr with all of heaven’s joys. This is loveless suicide that is contrary to God’s revelation. There is a huge distinction between the willing surrender of one’s life when it is needed (such as in the performance of one’s duty in the defense of one’s country, or community, or family, in ministering to the infectious sick, or in witnessing to one’s faith in time of persecution), and in the deliberate taking of it out of revenge to gain fame. True sacrifice is motivated by love, by mercy, not by anger, and the desire to punish other people.

Dr. Theodore Dalrymple, writing about the British Muslim suicide bombers of 7/7 in 2006, said that

“hatred is the underlying emotion. A man in prison who told me that he wanted to be a suicide bomber was more hate-filled than any man I have ever met. The offspring of a broken marriage between a Muslim man and a female convert, he had followed the trajectory of many young men in his area: sex and drugs and rock and roll, untainted by anything resembling higher culture. Violent and aggressive by nature, intolerant of the slightest frustration to his will and frequently suicidal, he had experienced taunting during his childhood because of his mixed parentage. After a vicious rape for which he went to prison, he converted to a Salafist form of Islam and became convinced that any system of justice that could take the word of a mere woman over his own was irredeemably corrupt.

I noticed one day that his mood had greatly improved; he was communicative and almost jovial, which he had never been before. I asked him what had changed his life for the better. He had made his decision, he said. Everything was resolved. He was not going to kill himself in an isolated way, as he had previously intended. Suicide was a mortal sin, according to the tenets of the Islamic faith. No, when he got out of prison he would not kill himself; he would make himself a martyr, and be rewarded eternally, by making himself into a bomb and taking as many of his enemies with him as he could.

Enemies, I asked; what enemies? How could he know that the people he killed at random would be enemies? They were enemies, he said, because they lived happily in our rotten and unjust society. Therefore, by definition, they were enemies. Surveys indicate that between 6 and 13 percent of British Muslims – that is, between 98,000 and 208,000 people – are sympathetic toward Islamic terrorists and their efforts.”

Suicide was practiced by the Romans in the first century as an honorable way to end o ne’s life. Christian teaching opposed the direct and deliberate taking of one’s own life for any self-regarding motive. We are not the author of our own lives. We are not owners of our bodies. They are entrusted to us by God, to be used in his service and in the service of others. It is not for us to decide for how long they shall be used. Directly and deliberately to destroy one’s own life is therefore a sin against God, our creator and redeemer, a rejection of his love and a denial of his sovereignty. It is an offense against the proper love of one’s own person made in God’s image to share his glory, and an act of despair. It is an offense against humanity in that it deprives one’s family and society of a member prematurely. It is to lose hope in God’s love, and to that extent to reject God. It also places a burden of guilt on relatives and friends, who may see it as a rejection of themselves and of their inadequate attempts to help. That is why it is regarded as loveless.

While such tragically misguided figures continually recur in history they are exceptional compared to those who regularly burn themselves out for a cause at the expense of their loved ones. Clergy and missionaries can see themselves as martyrs to the Gospel or the Church, sacrificing themselves, and their families in the attempt to play God in the lives of others. Other professionals, business entrepreneurs, politicians, and military leaders can do the same. They devote themselves to a worthy cause, or to the bottom line, or to the public, and neglect their relationships, their marriages and their families. Dr. Robert Pierce, founder of World Vision, sacrificed his own health and that of his marriage and children, in his devotion to the needy of the world. His motto was, “Let my heart be broken by the things that break the heart of God.” But, according to his daughter, he did not heed the admonition of St. Paul, “If anyone does not provide for his own relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” We can be successful at almost any venture if we are willing to sacrifice ourselves for it, but if it is at the expense of loving those closest to us, we gain nothing.

St. Paul cautions us to examine our motivations when we feel called to sacrifice. Is it out of gratitude to the love of God? Is it going to enable us to love others more? Is it going to show our love for those nearest and dearest to us? Howard Guinness wrote a Christian classic, first published in 1936, entitled, Sacrifice. It influenced generations of Christians to a deep and sacrificial walk with God. He commended the way of the Cross, which is the way of sacrifice, “but with such sacrifice come peace and joy everlasting. For Jesus said, ‘Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it,’ and ‘if a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies…. it bears much fruit.’” Of such sacrifice God is well pleased.

GUIDE FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

1. Read Matthew 6:2-4. How can sacrifice be loveless and worthless?

2. Read Matthew 25:35,36 and Philippians 4:18. What is the proper motivation for sacrifice?

3. How is the willing surrender of one’s life for one’s country, community and family different from suicide bombers?

4. Why was suicide rejected by the early Christians?

5. Why do some Christians sacrifice themselves and their families for their ministry?

6. Read 1 Timothy 4:8. How does this apply to the workaholic?

The poem also hangs on the wall beside my chair! It celebrates perseverance and endurance over the long run of life. As Jesus said, “He who stands firm [endures] to the end will be saved.” (Matthew 10:22 and 24:13) A prayer for courage and strength.

Whatever your opinion of JD Vance, his spiritual memoir COMMUNION, Finding my Way Back to Faith, is to my mind, an honest and humble description of his personal journey. I read several reviews of the book before I decided to read it. They were universally critical and cynical of his motives and his politics. I had read his previous memoir, HILLBILLY ELEGY, and viewed the movie. It was unique, well-written and became a national bestseller. This sequel is a tribute to the priority of family and faith over material success. While some reviewers focus on political and economic issues the book is about a young man’s search for meaning and purpose that he has found in his marriage, his family of origin, his children and his Christian faith. He strives to apply what he knows about Christianity to some of the controversial issues of the day. He does not flinch from confronting the criticisms of the Catholic church and those who would decry the Christian faith. Whatever you may think of his career, his politics, and his future, his emphasis in this memoir is on his struggles, his doubts, his friendships, and his faith, hope and love in his relationship with Jesus Christ. I think it is genuine and inspirational. In an age of secularism, atheism, materialism and cruelty it is a breath of fresh air. I recommend it heartily.

CHINA ALERT

On another note it is of great interest to me me that I have quite a readership of this blog in China and Hong Kong. Twice as many as many as the United States. I am gratified that so many view my posts. I would love to hear from any who would care to comment. May my readers be blessed.

“If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but I have not love, I am nothing.” (1 Corinthians 13:2)

Prophecy is one of the highest spiritual gifts. St. Paul says that we are to especially desire the gift of prophecy. (14:1) Prophecy is inspired speech, setting forth what God has revealed, even to prediction of things to come. It is the ability to inspire people with the message of God, or to communicate words directly inspired by God. It is here associated with understanding mysteries, or the secret truths, made known in the Gospel, of God’s purposes and acts at the end of time. To “fathom all mysteries and all knowledge” is to have a perfect understanding of what is going to happen to the church in the last days. It is to claim being privy to information not generally known, and the ability to make that knowledge available. Paul is reminding us that “I may know everything there is to know, but if I have no love I am nothing.”

He also says that I may claim to have miracle-working faith – faith that can move mountains – which was a proverbial expression which meant ‘to make what seems impossible possible,’ but if I have not love I am nothing.

There is the temptation for some Christians to claim to know everything, and to claim to be able to do anything, in the name of revelation and faith. But if it is done without regard for the care and concern we need to have for others (what Jesus defines as love for our neighbor as ourselves), if it is not motivated by love, then all this knowledge and faith is worthless.

Much contemporary prophetic teaching (a preoccupation with the end-times), and much faith teaching (the health and wealth Gospel) – is loveless. It is arrogant in its predictions and in its promises. It shows little humility and acceptance of suffering that is the mark of the Gospel of Jesus. It is triumphalist, desiring an earthly victory over evil, rather than incarnational, like Jesus, who was willing to take upon himself the sufferings of the world.

Today there is a profitable market for prophecy and knowledge about the end times. The Left Behind series of novels has sold more than 63 million copies. It purports to describe a possible scenario of prophetic fulfillment. Television evangelist Pat Robertson had a lesson devoted to Israel’s conflict with Hezbollah. It lays out how the action in Lebanon fits into a pattern of prophetic events beginning with the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, its subsequent wars, and the modern political realities and conflicts in the region. In an interview on CNN he proclaimed his belief that God would defend and protect the state of Israel, and that the battle described in Ezekiel 38 and 39 may be being fulfilled.

Basic to this conviction is the belief that the references to Israel in the Bible, can be applied directly to the political state of Israel today. Take Zechariah 12 for instance. Written around 520 B.C., both Haggai and Zechariah were encouraging the people of Israel, who were returning from exile in Babylon, to rebuild the Temple. Zechariah is also extensively quoted in the New Testament (seventy one times) for its Messianic prophecies. One third of these appear in the Gospels and thirty-one are found in the book of Revelation. Of all the Old Testament books, Zechariah is second only to Ezekiel in its influence on the book of Revelation. Its message was meant to strengthen the faith of the Jews as they faced opposition from the surrounding nations, by assuring them that God would protect them. “I will set out to destroy all the nations that attack Jerusalem.”

That prophecy was fulfilled during the sixth century when the Temple was rebuilt. There are many preachers who would apply this prophecy to the events of today, and identify the Jerusalem of then to the Jerusalem of today. They would say that Bible-believing Christians should support the state of Israel based on what the Old Testament prophesies. I do not want to be interpreted as being anti-Israel. I support the state of Israel for many good reasons: the right to exist in peace, the right to self-defense, support for democracy and freedom, and opposition to anti-Semitism. But I don’t think that biblical prophecy is a legitimate reason. I believe that references to Israel and Jerusalem in the Old Testament do not apply to the political, secular state of Israel today.

George Eldon Ladd, Professor of New Testament at Fuller Theological Seminary for many years, summed up 2,000 years of Christian interpretation when he stated that Old Testament prophecies must be interpreted in the light of the New Testament. The New Testament applies Old Testament prophecies to the New Testament church and in so doing identifies the church as spiritual Israel. Abraham is called “the father of all who believe.” If Abraham is the father of a spiritual people, and if all believers are sons of Abraham, his offspring, then it follows that they are Israel, spiritually speaking. This is what leads Paul to say, “For he is not a real Jew who is one outwardly, nor is true circumcision something external and physical. He is a Jew who is one inwardly, and real circumcision is a matter of the heart, spiritual and not literal.” “For we are the true circumcision, who worship God in spirit, and glory in Christ Jesus.” Paul applies prophecies to the church which in their Old Testament setting belong to literal Israel. He calls the church the sons, the seed, of Abraham. He calls believers the true circumcision. It is difficult therefore to avoid the conclusion that Paul sees the church as the spiritual Israel.

Many Old Testament passages, which applied in their historical setting to literal Israel, have in the New Testament been applied to the church. “You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God.”

It is my contention that prophetic interpretation is loveless when it stridently asserts a literal interpretation of the Old Testament, and then fits the New Testament into it. The apostolic writers of the New Testament received from Jesus that the promises of God no longer applied to the land of Israel, but to the kingdom of God that had no geographical boundaries, and was to be open to all people of all nations. The Promised Land was to be seen as the Jerusalem that is above, the Holy City of heaven, not an earthly city in the Middle East. That is the truths our hymns proclaim: Isaac Watts wrote, “We’re marching upward to Zion, The beautiful city of God.” John Newton wrote, “Glorious things of thee are spoken, Zion, city of our God.”

Loveless prophecy feeds a craving for conspiracy theories, and a sense of superiority to the rest of the world. The book of Revelation was written, like the book of Zechariah some six centuries before, to encourage the faith of God’s people, who were experiencing opposition and persecution. The imagery is that of the Old Testament prophets, but it is applied to the disciples of Christ, who were in symbolical exile in the metaphorical realm of Babylon, the idolatrous Roman Empire. Today it can be applied to Christians everywhere who are suffering for Christ. The stoking of alarm that many end-time preachers indulge in to heighten the importance of their message is artificial and inaccurate. They give the impression that current events prophesy a countdown to disaster (an Armageddon) that will bring in the kingdom. I call this loveless because it fosters fear and anxiety in their listeners, and demonizes others. The media’s daily tally of the dead and wounded in the current conflicts give rise to a scenario that implies that events are spiraling out of control. To put this into historical perspective it is sobering to realize that during five months of 1916 in World War I (the Great War to end all wars, to make the world safe for democracy!), the battles over Verdun and the Somme in France resulted in one million dead.

Loveless faith is the message that God will invariably prosper and heal you if you trust in him. It is to take the faith teaching in the Bible and to interpret it literally without qualification. Paul quotes Jesus, “I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” Jesus was using a popular colloquial phrase that referred to tearing up, uprooting, or pulverizing mountains as a hyperbole for removing difficulties. William Barclay comments: “Jesus never meant this to be taken physically and literally….What he meant was: ‘If you have faith enough, all difficulties can be solved, and even the hardest task can be accomplished.’ Faith in God is the instrument which enables men to remove the hills of difficulty which block their path. At no point did Jesus say that faith will cure every person, or prosper every person. The impossible that faith makes happen is that in the midst of suffering, in pain, in poverty, you can find the presence, and the strength, and the hope of God.

Loveless faith condemns the poor and the sick to second class Christianity. It is the religion of the wannabees, and the successful. It encourages self-righteousness, and the false assurance that God is on your side, and that is why you are blessed, and why others are not. It shows no compassion for the multitudes of the needy: the hungry, at-risk children, the disabled, and the dying.

Jesus said, “Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me you evildoers!’”

Why were these prophets and miracle-workers deficient? They were out of the will of God for their lives. They had confused their will with God’s will. They wanted to be successful, and when they had become so, they became proud of it. They boasted of their prophecies and their miracles of faith as evidence of their knowledge, their cornering of the mysteries of God. They gloried in their lavish lifestyles, and their fame. They were religious hucksters, peddling spiritual snake oil to the gullible and the desperate, who understandably longed for healing and for prosperity.

Contrast this example with the attitude of Jesus, which we are meant to emulate, who “made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness… he humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on the cross!”

Love for God, and love for your neighbor, is the willingness to humble yourself, to become like a child, to be willing to suffer, to be concerned for the other person in need, to show them mercy and compassion. It is to “look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.” It is to face your difficulties with courage and hope, knowing that God has better things in store for you in the future kingdom. It is to face each day as your opportunity to conquer evil in the name of the Lord, and by God’s grace to battle the enemy. God has promised to defend you and to protect you because you are his holy people. He will never leave you or forsake you. “For you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly, to the church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven.”

GUIDE FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

1. What is true biblical prophecy?

2. Why is much contemporary prophetic teaching about the end times loveless?

3. Read Romans 4:11,16 and Galatians 3:7,19. How are references to Israel in the Old Testament interpreted in the New Testament?

4. Read Romans 2:28,29 and Philippians 3:3 Who is spiritual Israel today and where is the Holy City, Jerusalem that is above, and Zion?

5. How should that interpretation of Scripture encourage Christians who are suffering for Christ?

6. How can the ‘faith’ teaching of the health and wealth prosperity Gospel be loveless?

7. Read Matthew 17:20,21. What do you think of Barclay’s interpretation of this saying?

8. Read Matthew 7:22,23. What disqualifies these prophets and miracle workers?

9. How can you believe God for answers to prayers for healing and blessing without falling into the trap of presuming upon God?

10. What is the characteristic of prophecy and faith that is loving?

“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.” (1 Corinthians 13:1)

What is the characteristic of speech without love? St. Paul confronted groups of people in the church in Corinth who valued verbal dexterity in the expression of their faith. I have to admit that I value those gifted with communication skills. So do most people. We want articulate, persuasive, and interesting speakers and preachers. But there are many dangers with slick speakers, who can appear so sincere, and so spiritual. Great orators can also be demagogues who can sway crowds to do what they want them to do. Remember Hitler? That is why St. James warned, “Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. We all stumble in many ways. If anyone is never at fault in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to keep his whole body in check.” Then he goes on to describe the power and danger of the tongue.

In Corinth, Paul had to deal with people who were critical of his speaking. “For some say, ‘His letters are weighty and forceful, but in person he is unimpressive and his speaking amounts to nothing.’” He admitted that he “did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.”

Rhetoric and oratory was a natural expression of the Greek spirit. Their schools trained orators for effective pleading in the law courts. They studied the principles of delivery (‘elocution’), logic, and persuasion. They cultivated the art of plausibility because of the reliance on circumstantial evidence and probability. Gorgias in Plato’s Dialogues introduced the emphasis on emotional appeal. Plato criticized the Sophists for their absence of fixed moral principles. They cared nothing for either moral presuppositions or moral consequences, but only for winning cases in court, and for political advantage. Paul rejected the literary and rhetorical devices of his day.

There was another group in the church that highly valued the spiritual gifts, especially the gift of tongues, which was thought to be the language of the angels. They were enthusiasts who enjoyed a charismatic or Pentecostal approach to worship. In 1 Corinthians 14 he provided guidelines for the use of ecstatic tongues in worship, so that it would not be disruptive. He laid down that speech in worship should be intelligible to all, that it should be understandable to the mind as well as the spirit, and that it should edify all. Tongues were not to be forbidden, but everything should be done in a fitting and orderly way.

To all groups Paul warned that if they exercised their particular approach without love, that their language, no matter how erudite or charismatic, would be as empty as the clash of gongs or cymbals in pagan worship.

I was attending a conference when an internationally known preacher and writer, an esteemed friend of mine, was delivering an address. As he spoke I took notes. His subject was important, and he treated it seriously. He was relentless in his exposition. He was thorough in his argument. He went on, and on, and on. In the end I gave up. He had too much material. It was over-kill. He lost me. My mind could not absorb any more information. He was insensitive and unloving in its expectations of his audience. My wife, Antoinette, wrote the following poem about it.

Communication is more than words

spewed forth from learned lips.

It is a meeting of minds,

a word fitly spoken.

It is not meant to echo off solid walls

but to take wings and fly,

to pierce to the divisions of joints and marrow.

It is intended to be deeply felt,

else it is just verbiage.

Falling flat on ears deafened by its hollow sound,

it becomes like intercourse without love;

an empty ritual.

I have heard preachers give sermons that were so academic, that they went straight over the heads of the congregation to whom they were supposed to be ministering. They were so out of touch with others, and concerned only with their own intellectual life, that they projected an arrogance of spirit that was unloving. I have heard others who were so into their agenda, so passionate about their cause, that they were like bulls in a china shop. Their intensity was frightening, and their emotional health was suspect. When I see some preachers on television I wonder how they can keep up the intensity? They rant and rave, and have the whole audience in an emotional frenzy.

None of this is new. The Ranters were a mid-seventeenth century movement in England. They were part of the effort of the time to restore primitive, apostolic Christianity. This involved repudiating the established church and emphasizing individual thought and action. It produced a great variety of groups around prominent leaders. They had two marked characteristics: they were pantheistic and antinomian. Their pantheism was expressed in their belief that God was identified with their opinions, so that they claimed divine inspiration for their utterance (a form of angelic speech). Their antinomianism was seen in their morally disordered lives. They considered themselves above the usual distinction of right and wrong. Many of them were punished for their immoral and blasphemous acts.

There is much that passes for ‘testimony about God’ that has the same characteristics today. Some preachers think that the Holy Spirit is leading them into new truth, and they preach a message that is above the usual distinctions of right and wrong. As a result they lead morally disordered lives. In a misguided endeavor to be loving and accepting they end up enabling others in their immaturity, their addictions, their obsessive-compulsive and generally unhealthy and unholy behavior. They do not preach Jesus Christ and him crucified, because it implies that they are sinners in need of forgiveness and renewal. Their message is not with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, because that implies that they need a power greater than themselves in order to change their lives, and they are not seeking change but acceptance of themselves as they are.

As I listen to such preachers I am aware of the seductive appeal of personal stories about our innate goodness. They flatter us about how God has made us the way we are and loves us whatever we do. They make us feel good about community, about belonging, about being on the cutting edge of new thought, new interpretations of civil rights, new definitions of marriage and family, new understanding of personal gender identity, and a new commitment to social justice. It seems so loving, so caring, so Christlike.

But I believe such language is loveless. It is Christless – there is no Christ crucified – redemption. It is immoral and unholy – for its goes against the commandments – the express will of God. It is passive. The word we use for it is “enabling.” Enabling is the term that is used to indicate behavior that tolerates, sometimes ignores or denies, or even promotes self-destructive patterns of behavior by another person. The person who is doing it thinks that they are being loving by their tolerating such behavior. But such so-called ‘love’ is in fact enabling the person to continue in their unhealthy, unchristian, patterns of life. By enabling them we delay them having to face the consequences of their actions or inaction. We give them the impression that no matter how much they screw up, and go against the revealed will of God, somebody will always be there to rescue them from their mistakes, their failures, their sins. We make a distinction between helping and enabling. The Good Samaritan helped the man who fell among thieves. Helping is doing something for someone that they are not capable of doing themselves. Enabling is doing for someone things that they could, and should be doing for themselves. Enabling creates an atmosphere in which people, out of the will of God, can comfortably continue their unacceptable behavior.

Too many preachers are enablers. That can go for parents, grandparents and spouses as well. Too many families and churches make it easy for us to continue to deny that we have a problem. The message we hear is that God solves all our problems for us. The language implies that love is unconditional toleration, like sweet molasses poured over anything that may threaten our complacency.

The love of Christ, is tough love, the love that took him to the Cross so that we might be redeemed, changed, renewed. It is love that has boundaries. It is love that does not excuse, that is willing to tell the truth, that is willing to disagree. Language that is full of love will speak to the real, personal needs of the one we are speaking to, not over their heads, not disguised in spiritual language, but directly to the heart and mind of the other.

GUIDE FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

1. Read James 3:1-12. Why is speech so dangerous?

2. Read 1 Corinthians 2:1-5. What was Paul’s priority in speaking? What was he warning against?

3. What problems have you had with some preaching you have heard?

4. What characteristics of the Ranters are present with us today?

5. Why is the affirmation that God loves us just as we are and does not require us to change in reality loveless?

6. What makes language loveless?

7. What is the difference between helping and enabling? Where have you seen examples of enabling?

8. What is wrong with unconditional toleration?

9. What is tough love? How have you experienced it?

The word ‘love’ has an elusive quality. It can stand for romance (I love my wife), for passion (I love philosophy and tennis), for friendship (I love particular acquaintances), for desire (I love food or books), for appreciation (I love nature, art and music), for protectiveness (I love my children and grandchildren), patriotism (I love my country), as well as for charity (I love what I can do for the needy), and sacrifice (I love what I can give up to make a difference). St. Paul tells us that we have a continuing debt to love one another, that we owe it to love one another without any thought of repayment. This debt can never be paid. It continues while we live. There can be no end to it.

What form does this debt take? How do we pay it? By fulfilling the ten commandments. “Love is the fulfillment of the law.” By fulfilling the law we love our neighbor as ourselves. Love is not just emotion or sentiment. “Its expression is always moral and is revealed in obedience.” The commandments make explicit in detail what is summed up by love. The commandments spell out what love means. St. Paul lists some of them:

“Do not commit adultery [with all that Jesus interpreted that to mean in terms of our attitude to sexual desire, to lust, to treat people as sexual objects, to define ourselves in terms of our gender, our proclivities],

Do not murder [with all that Jesus interpreted that to mean in terms of our anger, our insulting words, our grievances and resentments],

Do not steal [with all that Jesus interpreted that to mean in terms of our taking advantage of others, enriching ourselves at the expense of the company or the public purse, and being miserly towards God and others by using what he has given us as stewards for our own purposes],

Do not covet [with all that Jesus interpreted that to mean in terms of our desires for possessions to make us feel important, being a taker rather than a giver], and whatever other commandments there may be, are summed up in this one rule: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

Love is to be seen concretely in terms of how we treat one another, by what we show is valuable in our lives. Love is to be demonstrated by our actions not just by our words. We know people who say they love us but they cause us pain and grief by their actions. They may be parents, children, spouses, friends or colleagues.

Jesus tells the parable of the two sons. Their father asks them to go and work for him that day in the vineyard. One said he would, but didn’t go. The other said he wouldn’t go, but later did. The one who did what his father wanted, rather than the one who said what he thought the father wanted to hear, was to be commended. Jesus used the parable to expose the hypocrisy of the religious leaders who said that they were doing God’s will but weren’t. He claimed that it was the outsiders, the tax collectors and the prostitutes, who repented, and changed their actions, who would enter the kingdom of heaven before the religious leaders.

We can profess our faith, but if we do not practice it, we are not to be commended. We can profess that we love our neighbor as ourselves, but if we do not practice it, we stand condemned. “What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith, but has no deeds? Can such faith save him…faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. But someone will say, ‘You have faith; I have deeds.’ Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.”

Just as love is the fulfilling of the law – the keeping of the commandments – Christ is the fulfillment of the law. Jesus Christ brought the law to completion by obeying perfectly its expectations, and by fulfilling its types and prophecies. Jesus fulfilled the commandments, and by so doing showed us what a life of love looks like. Do you want to know what love looks like? Do you want to see love in action? Do you want to see the Son who perfectly fulfills the Father’s will? Do you want to see the Son who labors in his Father’s vineyard? Then look at Christ. Love in him was pure action. There was no moment in his life when love was merely a feeling, a word to please, or a mood. His love was pure action.

In his love there was no demand on any other person, or on any other person’s time, energy, assistance, service. What Christ asked of others was for their benefit. He loved others more deeply than they loved themselves. In his love there was no compromising, no excusing, no avoidance, no manipulation. He made no distinction between people. He did not put his family before others. He even said that his disciples were his mother and his brothers. “For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” He did not prefer one disciple over another, for his love was for all equally, who would permit themselves to be saved. His life was pure love as he worked and prayed. As a reward he demanded nothing, for the only purpose of his whole life from birth to death, was to offer himself in service. It was not just what he said that was love, it was what he did: fed the hungry, healed the sick, drove out evil spirits, raised the dead, had compassion on the needy. He was the explanation of the law and the commandments. He was the end, the goal, the fulfillment of the law, which is love.

If to love our neighbor as ourselves is to be like Christ in the fulfilling of the commandments, then the definition of this love requires an intimate relationship with God. Jesus was who he was by virtue of his relationship with his Father. His life was characterized by his desire to do his Father’s will. Therefore to love our neighbor is to love God and his will for our lives. Christian love is defined by our belonging to God, as revealed in his written Word: the Holy Scriptures. If love is the fulfilling of the law as seen in Jesus, then it is clear from the Gospels what actions are expected of us by God. It is this sort of clarity and specificity about what constitutes true love that is disputed by the world.

What the unbelieving world understands by love, and what God understands by it, is entirely different. For the world, love is whatever the majority of society believe it to be. For the world, love can change according to popular opinion. For the world, values can change according to human determination. For the world, morality is seen to be an accidental matter which can evolve as time goes by. For the world, when a great number do what the commandments consider wrong, then wrong is declared to be right. But if contemporary men and women decide for themselves what is right and wrong, what they consider love to be, instead of God, Christ, and his written Word, then they are personally guilty of insurrection against God. When loving our neighbor has no relation to the commandments, no relation to Christ, no relation to doing God’s will, then a mutiny has occurred against God. Love becomes a relative term.

Love for the unbelieving world is selfishness. It is to look out for number one. It is to seek one’s happiness above all else. I received a promotion for a book entitled, “Totally Fulfilled” by Dean Graziosi. He promises that “Whatever it is you desire, I’ve got a solution for you that can move you in that winning direction! Let me show you how easy it truly can be to live a life that is Totally Fulfilled. Love, confidence, abundance, joy, peace, freedom and happiness beyond anyone’s wildest dreams!” With it came bonuses of other self-help resources: “Self-Promotion Secrets of the Super Successful, How To Carve Out and Live Your Ultimate Lifestyle, 101 Ways to Unleash Your Potential, Make Your Life a Masterpiece! What the world honors and loves under the name of love is group-selfishness. Whatever the group may be to which we aspire, we adopt their values, their priorities, their definitions of the will of God, of love. We seek the approval of others in the group.

God, on the other hand, understands love to be sacrificing love – sacrificing love which makes room for God, even at the cost of being rejected by others. Remember that the incarnation of love, Jesus, the Son of God, was rejected and despised of men, and was executed for his life and message. God has given us in Christ and the commandments a holding-on place in existence, a certainty in the midst of confusion. The law of Christ’s love gives us substance and truth in the midst of the vague and hazy ideas of what love is marketed by the world.

Love as understood by the world is mutuality: if I love you I expect you to love me back. It is conditional love. “I expect to get something back for my investment.” This kind of ‘love’ is an investment, not the paying of a debt. It is the oil that lubricates the world’s agenda. It is, “if I scratch your back, you can scratch my back.” You owe me.

Christian love, the love that is explained by Christ, that Christ fulfilled in his person, is a triangular relationship that includes God. Love is of God. To love another person is to help him to love God, and to be loved by God. To love is to do God’s will, it is to be like Christ. To love your neighbor as yourself is to love God with all your heart, and mind, and soul, and strength. When you love others for God’s sake, you are saved from self-interest, and can devote yourself to loving others without needing anything in return.

Such love comes at a price. The debt that is paid requires the willingness to give, to love, to care, to sacrifice. This willingness comes out of the love which God puts in our hearts by his Spirit. It does not come naturally to us. That is why the world finds it ridiculous, foolish. We can only love our neighbor in this way through the power of the Holy Spirit. For “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.”

This is true Total Fulfillment. The Message puts Galatians 5:22-25 like this: “But what happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard – things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitment, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. …Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads, but work out its implications in every detail in our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original.”

GUIDE FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

1. Read Romans 13:8-10. What does Paul mean that loving one another is a debt?

2. How is loving our neighbor the fulfillment of the law?

3. Read Matthew 21:28-32. What is the point Jesus is making?

4. Read James 2:14-18. What is his point?

5. How can we know what a life of love looks like? Do you know someone like this? What are they like?

6. What is the difference between what the world understands by love and the New Testament?

7. What is deceiving about the promises of Total Fulfillment as seen in so many self-help books? How does it differ from the promises of the Gospel?

8. Why is conditional love, the expectation of mutuality in love, inadequate and self-defeating?

9. What is the price of loving as a debt to be paid?

10. Read Galatians 5:22-25. What does it teach us about loving our neighbor?

When Jesus commands us to love our neighbors as ourselves, and illustrates it by telling the parable of the Good Samaritan, he is saying that we are to love everybody according to their need. There are no exceptions to this command. In contrast to romantic love or friendship, love of neighbor is non-preferential love. We prefer to love our beloved, our loved ones, and our friends, because of our special, reciprocal relationships with them. We love them in part because they love us back. But neighbor love is love which is unselfish, which gives and expects nothing in return.

Jesus gives an example of this at a dinner party hosted by a prominent Pharisee, when he noticed how the guests were picking the places of honor at the table. “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

Is this Jesus with tongue in cheek trying to make his point – don’t do something good to score an advantage over others?

This is an act of love that expects no return. It is unselfish love because those whom you invite cannot repay you. Yet you will be blessed by their gratitude, and at the final resurrection. A practical application of this might be that instead of spending lavishly on your friends to impress them, to guarantee your social acceptability, and to secure continuing good relationships, you will give to ministries to the needy.

If you find these words of Jesus difficult, what about the following application of loving your neighbor as yourself?

“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ lend to ‘sinners’, expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will become sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”

In the parable of the Good Samaritan it was the one who showed mercy who was neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers. Because God is merciful, we too are called to be merciful to others, including our enemies. Imagine if the victim on the road were your enemy, the person who had hurt you. What would you do? Rather than rushing to help him you might gloat a little. The temptation would be to rejoice in his downfall, and to believe that he got what was coming to him. But Jesus said that to be a neighbor is to show mercy. This means loving unconditionally every human being – a very difficult, if not impossible task. We cannot do it in our own strength. It is unnatural. We need the love, the mercy of God, in us, to enable us to do it. It is only Christ in us who can help us to love our enemies.

It may mean that when we are hardly able to endure the sight of our neighbor, because of what he has done to us, or what he represents, we have to shut our eyes, so that we do not see him when we do good to him. Jesus tells us that we must listen to the command of God, and to become like him in his loving all people, the just and the unjust, without distinction, and not to notice to whom we are showing mercy. Loving one’s neighbor makes us blind to distinctions so that we blindly love everyone. We see everyone as a creature of God and therefore kin to us. God has created all and Christ has redeemed all. Therefore we should not pay attention to the differences between people.

The Scriptures teach us that our neighbor is our equal in the sight of God. We do not love someone because we prefer them to others because of their education, or their cultural or social acceptability. We are always going to be tempted to love some people more than others because of their congeniality to us.

We are tempted to ignore a person who is different from us, as though he or she does not exist for us. We are tempted to avoid contact with people who inconvenience us, or embarrass us by their condition. This was the case of the man who fell into the hands of the robbers on the road from Jerusalem to Jericho. The priest and the Levites passed by and ignored the man. They had their own circles in which they felt comfortable, and this man did not belong to them.

Most of us contrive to live only in our social circle and to shield ourselves from those outside it. This is unconscious. We are not aware that we do this. We may move from one familiar circle to another, but on the way we strive not to notice others, unless we should happen to meet someone who is more distinguished, with whom we want to be acquainted, or by whom we want to be noticed. It is important to us not to be seen among less important people, unless we are to be acknowledged as more important, and therefore we can be condescending, yet never so that we can be accused of offending or hurting them. We may be ready to be extremely courteous towards those below us on the social scale, but we must never associate with them as equals.

Academics, intellectuals, writers, actors, politicians, and artistic celebrities, may lecture enthusiastically on the necessity of loving all people equally, but they are anxious to maintain their understanding of their superior status. Those who enjoy great wealth may support the idea of loving their neighbor, but they do so at a distance, and try to separate themselves as much as possible from the common herd. From a distance of concealed patronizing it is easy to recognize and value loving one’s neighbor without distinction, for at a distance the neighbor is a figment of one’s imagination. It is when the man or woman walks by him, and is close at hand, that it is hard to recognize and value him as our neighbor. It is easy to generalize loving one’s neighbor; but harder when it comes down to a specific person.

We discover our neighbor when we follow Jesus, and walk with him. He leads us to recognize who is our neighbor, and how we ought to respond to him. It is one thing to understand that we ought to love our neighbor. It is another thing to act on that understanding. It is easy to think good thoughts, to make magnanimous vows, and to believe in good works. It is so much harder to do something about it.

St. James addressed this problem as it surfaced in the early church at their Sunday worship.

“My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes ….have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts….If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’ you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers.”

Soren Kierkegaard argued that Christianity brought an understanding of equality into the world. The Gospel of Jesus taught that we all exist on an equal basis before God, whatever our status was in society. Therefore we should love one another without distinction.

Shakespeare wrote that:

“All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players.”

Kierkegaard makes the point that when the curtain falls, the one who played the king, and the one who played the beggar, and all the others – they are all alike: actors. When in death the curtain falls, we are all one; we are all human beings. The distinctions of earthly existence are only like an actor’s costume that is cast off. At the end we all shed our roles. It is the height of deception and artistry for an actor to become his role in the play. But the differences between us are only a disguise for the purposes of the play. Each of us is a neighbor to the other. We do not exist as neighbors because of our distinctions but because of our common humanity. In being king, beggar, scholar, rich or poor, male or female, we do not resemble each other. In our roles we are all different. But in being a neighbor we are all unconditionally like each other. Our distinctions are temporary, but our neighborliness is eternal.

Take many sheets of paper and write something different on each one. Then they do not resemble each other. But hold each sheet up to the light and you see the same watermark on them all. Being the neighbor is the common mark, but you see it only by the help of the light of the Gospel when it shines through distinction.

Love is blind to distinctions. Love sees through the outward roles to the person God loves, and whom we are called to love in his name and power. When we see a person, what do we see? Do we see the outward disguise or the inward reality of the person? “So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”  Jesus made no distinction between the people that he healed or helped. He ministered to the needs of the unclean, the lepers, the unlovely, the hungry, and the oppressed. He saw them all as sinners needing salvation. There was no racial, sexual, ethnic, religious, educational, or social distinction. He saw everyone as his neighbor.

This is not an optional commandment for Christians. Hard as it may be, we are all called to love our neighbor without distinction. It requires us to act on what we know to be true. It requires us seeking God’s strength to show God’s mercy to others.

What would the world be like if we lived out this commandment without distinction? It would mean that all the prejudices that divide us would be overcome. What would your world be like if you loved your neighbor without distinction? How would you see the people around you? How would you show them the love and mercy of God? How would you see your own way of relating to others outside your social circle? How would you love your enemies? Seek the mind and strength of the Spirit of Christ to fill you with his mercy.

GUIDE FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

1. Read Luke 14:12-14. How much do you think hospitality is motivated by the desire for reciprocation?

2. Read Luke 6:32-36. How can we love our enemies or those we dislike when they are in need?

3. How can we relate to people different from ourselves without condescension or being patronizing?

4. How do we avoid the hypocrisy of saying that we love our neighbor when it comes down to a specific person?

5. How does Jesus lead us to recognize who is our neighbor, and how we ought to respond to him?

6. How can we avoid showing people favoritism because they are attractive to us, while ignoring those who are not?

7. Read James 2:1-9. How can we love our neighbor in church?

8. What do you think of Shakespeare’s and Kierkegaard’s analogy that we are merely actors and that at the end of life we all shed our roles? How does it help you to love others?

9. What would the world be like if we made no distinction between people?

10. How would you relate to others outside your social circle?

The Gospels record that Jesus affirmed that the second great commandment is to “Love your neighbor as yourself.” This is easier said than done. It raises all sorts of questions in our minds. One of them, asked by a lawyer in order to narrow its application was, “Who is my neighbor?” But before I get to that let me ask this question: “How does God expect us to love our neighbor?” The answer is inherent in the commandment: apparently by our understanding of how we love ourselves. We are expected to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.

One of the biggest barriers to loving our neighbor as ourselves is the inability to love ourselves as God loves us. Many hate themselves, or what they have become, and have no love to give to others. Many love themselves in the wrong way, and seek to bolster their love of themselves in self-destructive ways. So they drug and drink themselves to death, or cause the violent deaths of others.

Soren Kierkegaard wrote that there is a proper and an improper form of self-love. There is selfish love of self, and there is a spiritual love of self. The person who does not know how to love himself properly is not capable of loving others. He is so obsessed with his own need for love that he cannot relate positively to others. The ‘selfish,’ exclusive love of self, does not care for anyone beyond himself. The ‘proper,’ inclusive love of self, seeks the good of others, because it recognizes what it needs for oneself.

When a person degrades herself by allowing herself to be used by others and exploited, she has not learned to love herself. When a person allows himself to be bought, bribed, or otherwise corrupted, he has not rightly learned to love himself. When a person seeks power and fame, and abuses it for his own satisfaction, he has not learned to love himself rightly. When a woman becomes a doormat for her husband and enables him in his tyranny, she has not learned to rightly love herself. When a man wastes his time and energy in the service of empty accomplishments in order to boost his ego, he has not rightly learned to love himself. When the frivolous woman throws herself into social engagements in order to escape her loneliness, she does not understand how to love herself rightly. The woman who is depressed or otherwise self-destructive, who surrenders to despair because she has been betrayed or rejected, does not know how to love herself rightly. When a man who is self-tormented tries to martyr himself, or take his own life, he does not have a genuine understanding of how a man ought to love himself. When a person measures his worth by the standards of success in the culture, and feels himself a failure, he does not possess proper self love.

What is legitimate self-love? If we are called to love everyone, that includes ourselves. No one is to be excluded from our love, not even ourselves. If we value God’s creation, God’s gifts, we must value ourselves as one of those gifts. If God values us then we cannot but do otherwise. If God, by his grace, finds us worthy of love, then we should also. “We love because he first loved us.” We learn what love is from seeing how God loves us. We appreciate God’s love by recognizing how high a price he has set on us in the Cross.

Proper self-love is the standard by which we shall love our neighbor. We ought to love our neighbor as we ought to love ourselves. We ought to love our neighbors as we are loved by God. We love ourselves by seeking God’s kingdom, seeking his truth, seeking his blessing, seeking his fulfillment and satisfaction, seeking his goals for our lives. We love ourselves by seeking God’s best for us. We love ourselves by taking care of ourselves. It is our responsibility to take care of ourselves so that we have the ability to love others, to have something to give them. What we want for ourselves we will want for others We have a need for forgiveness, for respect, for love, for health and wholeness..

In the parable of the Good Samaritan we can identify with, either the victim, who has been left half dead by the side of the road, or the other travelers. The priest and the Levite, who hurry on past, lest they too are assaulted, are insecure. They see anyone who needs help to be beneath them. They are too wrapped up in themselves, and their self-sufficiency, to consider the needs of someone else. Theirs is a selfish self-love, turned in on themselves, because of their insecurity.

If we identify with the victim we can imagine how we would like to be treated by others. We know how we would like to be loved by realizing how we ourselves would like to be treated under the same circumstances. The kind of care the Samaritan provided is an illustration of the kind of care we believe is implied by the qualification “as yourself.” This is the teaching of the Golden Rule: “do to others what you would have them do to you.” He does what we would like others to do for us: dressing our wounds, taking us to a hotel, and taking care of us until we recover, to continue our journey unaided.

The victim stands for anyone who is mugged on the road that is life. The wounds received may be emotional rather than physical. The roadside may be a family in which there is much emotional pain that is covered over and denied. The family or the relationship may be controlling and manipulative. The robbers may be those who hold emotional power over the victim, who strip him or her of his sense of self love, beat him down over the years, and leave him to live a diminished life – half alive, and half dead. The antagonists may be priests and Levites, religious people, church people, upstanding in the community; but nonetheless robbers of the lives of those they abuse. There is no freedom to become your own person, to form your own God-given identity, in that relationship. So many people are robbed of a healthy self love by those who beat them down and expect them to conform to what they expect them to be, instead of what God has created them to be. So much domestic violence takes place because of lack of proper self love.

A person with proper self love has such a healthy regard for himself, and a sense of the worth of his own identity in Christ, that he does not have to cling onto another in a co-dependent way. He is willing to give up the other person, to allow him to distance himself, to let go in the relationship, for the sake of the good of the other person. So many friendships, and family relationships are unhealthy because one person sees the other person as a way of fulfilling themselves in a co-dependent way. That person can be like a parasite, sucking the life out of the other. If we love the other person, such as our child, we are willing to let her go her own way for the sake of her future growth. To love our neighbor as ourselves means not to cling on to them (for we do not want others to cling on to us), or stifle them with our expectations and claims on them. We value our independence. Therefore, we would not demand that our neighbor, or family member, become like us, or model themselves on us, or agree with us, in order to be accepted. To love our neighbor as ourselves is to respect the separate identity of the other person, and to rejoice in their independent development apart from us.

Loving our neighbor as ourselves is a safeguard against loving our neighbor less than ourselves, as well as loving others more than ourselves. To love others more than ourselves is to beggar oneself, to not take care of ourselves so that we cannot continue to love others. How can we love our neighbor if we do not love ourselves? Part of the problem of the human condition is that we are conflicted about ourselves. On the one hand we can love ourselves too much and become egotistical. On the other hand we can love ourselves too little and become envious of others. If the former we then see others as serving our needs by using them to fulfill our egotistical desires. If the latter we see ourselves as victims and others as being privileged. In both cases we believe that our relationships with others can become means to ends in fulfilling our needs. In other words our self-centeredness causes us to find ways to use others for our fulfillment. That is why some people use politics to manipulate others to do their will.

Envy of others causes us to want to find ways to become like them either by motivating us to achieve what we perceive them to have or by seeking ways to take from them what we desire to have for ourselves. The first way leads us to excel in whatever way we can in education, sports, marriage, the arts, business or public affairs. The second way leads us to crime, intrigue, socialism, acquisitions, military aggression, manipulation, blackmail and fraud.

Egotism causes us to want to use others for our fulfillment by domination, bullying, sexual promiscuity, and subjugation. The egotist wants to recreate others into his image, to remodel others, to push his agenda, to exalt his ideas, to silence his opponents, to crush the other person’s individuality or make life miserable for him.

The problem for our society is when these attitudes become enshrined in our politics. The only antidote to save us from these attitudes is to discover who we really are and what our needs are in relation to God. Jesus prefaced this command by saying that the first commandment is to love God with all your heart, mind and strength. By repenting of our self-centeredness and turning to God for our forgiveness and redemption we put God, our Creator and Savior, first in our lives and ask for the empowering of the Holy Spirit to love ourselves properly. If this is done we can find ways to deal with our envy and our egotism and discover our true spiritual nature in Christ by becoming a new creation.

Jesus said that we should love ourselves as we would love our neighbor, for to love oneself in the right way, and to love our neighbor is the same thing. When you love yourself in the same way as you love your neighbor, you love your neighbor as yourself. The teaching of Christ is that a person should love his neighbor as himself, that is, as he ought to love himself. Is this something you do? Is this something you need to work on for yourself, and for those you love? What do you need to do in order to love your neighbor as yourself?

GUIDE FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

1. How do you balance the need to acknowledge your sins and need for forgiveness with proper self-love?

2. How does the awareness of our own need for forgiveness affect our attitude to others?

3. What is the difference between a proper and an improper form of self-love?

4. Give an example from your experience of lack of proper self-love.

5. How do we love ourselves properly?

6. Who do you identify with in the Parable of the Good Samaritan? Why?

7. How can we avoid confusing loving our neighbor with co-dependency?

8. What is the antidote to envy and egotism?

FDR’s Address to the Nation: 82 Years Ago Today

“My fellow Americans: Last night, when I spoke with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at that moment that troops of the United States and our allies were crossing the Channel in another and greater operation. It has come to pass with success thus far.

And so, in this poignant hour, I ask you to join with me in prayer:

Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity.

Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith.

They will need Thy blessings. Their road will be long and hard. For the enemy is strong. He may hurl back our forces. Success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again; and we know that by Thy grace, and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph.

They will be sore tried, by night and by day, without rest-until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame. Men’s souls will be shaken with the violences of war.

For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and good will among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home.

Some will never return. Embrace these, Father, and receive them, Thy heroic servants, into Thy kingdom.

And for us at home — fathers, mothers, children, wives, sisters, and brothers of brave men overseas — whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them–help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.

Many people have urged that I call the Nation into a single day of special prayer. But because the road is long and the desire is great, I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts.

Give us strength, too — strength in our daily tasks, to redouble the contributions we make in the physical and the material support of our armed forces.

And let our hearts be stout, to wait out the long travail, to bear sorrows that may come, to impart our courage unto our sons wheresoever they may be.

And, O Lord, give us Faith. Give us Faith in Thee; Faith in our sons; Faith in each other; Faith in our united crusade. Let not the keenness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but fleeting moment let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose.

With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy. Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogancies. Lead us to the saving of our country, and with our sister Nations into a world unity that will spell a sure peace a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men. And a peace that will let all of men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil.

Thy will be done, Almighty God.

Amen.”

(Copied with thanks from Erick-Woods Erickson: 82 Years Ago Today)

To love someone at all times is not easy. To learn to love is a life’s work. It requires everything of us. Love challenges us every day.

Sometimes when I walk on the beach I come across a heart scratched in the sand, with the names of two people entwined in it. The next day the impression has been erased by the tide. Love should not be so easily destroyed. Relationships are precious to us. They affect our deepest emotions. Our greatest joys come from fulfilling relationships of love, and our greatest sorrows come from the ending of those relationships.

We have been created by a God whose essence is love. We are made in his image to have relationships of love with one another. Jesus said that the most important commandment was to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” Therefore, we fulfill the purpose of our creation when we love God and our neighbor in this way. But that is easier said than done. How do we go about it? What does it mean for me today to love others? How can I do it? That is the subject of this book.

Zygmunt Bauman, Professor of Sociology at the University of Leeds and the University of Warsaw, characterized the present age as ‘liquid.’ In his book “Liquid Love” he describes post-modern relationships as lacking commitment. Relationships are fluid, they are not trustworthy, they are unlikely to last. The meaning of the word love has been devalued. Sexually it describes a passing experience rather than an enduring affection. One-night stands, hooking up with strangers, are talked about under the code name of ‘making love’.

Love is seen as a skill, a commodity in a consumer culture that can be acquired at little cost to the customer. Like availability of credit, casual love takes the ‘waiting out of wanting’. It is a fast food that satisfies immediate need but can affect your long-term health if that is your only nourishment. People become disposable. Like unwanted gifts they can be returned or exchanged for a new and improved version. Partnerships are not expected to last for a lifetime. A relationship is an investment, and like a stock, you hold it as long as it promises to rise in value, and sell it when it begins to falter. The relationship only lasts as long as it produces value for you.

Living together does not require a down-payment, there is less mortgage to repay, and the length of the repayment is less daunting. There is no commitment to future kinship. All options stay open. Unconditional commitment ‘till death us do part’, for better for worse and for richer and poorer is seen as a trap that needs to be avoided at all costs. Temporary ‘we will see how it works’ cohabitation means that you are only as good as your last encounter. You are at the mercy of constant evaluation. You have surrendered your assets to your partner, and are subject to emotional blackmail. Survival is tenuous. Such liquid love is unstable. When the tide of ‘love’ runs out there is a feeling of being used, of being depleted, rejected, of having failed to please. All there is to show for the experience are disappointed hopes.

This is also the case for serial marriage – the marriages that do not last but end in divorce. Many times such a marriage is doomed because one of the partners is not prepared to grow in solid love for the other. Instead of the relationship being affirming and life-giving, it is characterized by hurt and abuse.

Lack of solid love also affects having children. Starting a family is delayed until it is convenient. A baby has to be wanted! Children may bring joy but they also can threaten your career. You may have to choose between having a baby and achieving your professional ambitions. Love of your neighbor (in this case your baby) may compete with love of yourself – and are you not supposed to love your neighbor as yourself?

In contrast to this modern conception of love as liquid, the Bible proposes a love that is solid. It is meant to endure all vicissitudes: love never ends. If God is love, and we are made for love, then love may be described in all its dimensions: length, height, and depth. Solid love is greater than ourselves. It requires concentration, thought, effort, willpower, motivation, and application. Learning to love is the task of a lifetime. It is a challenge to grow into maturity. It is the journey to wholeness. It is the struggle of unselfishness over self-centeredness. It is hard, for our self-absorption, our ego, our sinfulness, has such a tight hold on us.

Soren Kierkegaard expressed the character of love in many of his writings. He eloquently articulated the importance of love:

“What is it that makes a person great, admired by creation, well pleasing in the eyes of God? What is it that makes a person strong, stronger than the whole world; what is it that makes him weak, weaker than a child? What is it that makes a person unwavering, more unwavering than a rock; what is it that makes him soft, softer than wax? — it is love!

What is it that is older than everything? It is love. What is it that outlives everything? It is love. What is it that cannot be taken but itself takes all? It is love. What is it that cannot be given but itself gives all? It is love. What is it that perseveres when everything falls away? It is love. What is it that comforts when all comfort fails? It is love.

What is it that endures when everything is changed? It is love. What is it that remains when the imperfect is abolished? It is love. What is it that witnesses when prophecy is silent? It is love. What is it that does not cease when the vision ends? It is love. What is it that sheds light when the dark saying ends? It is love.

What is it that gives blessing to the abundance of the gift? It is love. What is it that gives pith to the angel’s words? It is love. What is it that makes the widow’s gift an abundance? It is love. What is it that turns the words of the simple person into wisdom? It is love.

What is it that is never changed even though everything is changed? It is love; and that alone is love, that which never becomes something else.”